Improving online student success can be overwhelming, but findings from a recent Eduventures study suggest that it is not as complicated as it seems. What really helps online students succeed is adherence to a couple basic of measures of quality that have always informed effective course design.

Insights on Online Student Performance

In the spring of 2015, Eduventures fielded the Eduventures’ 2015 Online Student Survey of 28,000 students, primarily adult learners over the age of 25, who are currently pursuing a degree or certificate program online. One goal of this research was to help our clients better understand factors driving or hindering success in an online learning environment. As part of our survey, we asked respondents to assess their academic performance to date, with responses ranging from “great” to “very poor,” and to identify specific factors they say contribute to high or low performance.

Here is what we found:

High performing students said the basis for their success is having clear course objectives and expectations at the outset and easy-to-use technology. These factors far outweighed others like faculty and peer interaction and even advising or tutoring services, which are valuable but of much lower importance in the minds of students.

Poorly performing students said that, beyond the usual factors, such as personal distractions and lack of motivation, they struggle most with the pace of their courses, which many said move too quickly. While some personal touches would improve performance among this at-risk population, objectives and expectations rose to the top once again. A smaller, but significant, number also cited confusing or difficult to use technology as a barrier to their success.

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Improve Student Success by Getting Back to Basics

To boost online student success, launch a “back to basics” campaign among key stakeholders involved in online learning. Include faculty, instructional designers, program leaders, vendors, and, of course, your students. Start this campaign by focusing on the following priorities:

Align your online courses with objective design standards to improve performance. Ensure all of your online courses pass through a rigorous peer review process. Enlist faculty, instructional designers, and course experts to carefully check for the presence of clear objectives and expectations and to weigh in on their effectiveness in guiding student learning. Focus also on improving the performance of existing courses through a post-design quality assurance process. As outlined in Eduventures’ online course review rubric, this process should assess how clearly objectives and expectations are stated at the outset of the course and how pervasive they remain throughout the learning experience. Findings should be quantified, shared with instructors, and continuously measured to ensure improvement over time.

Optimize use of your learning management system (LMS) to enhance the student experience. Just as a live classroom should be easy to navigate, clean, and hospitable, so too should your LMS. This environment should prioritize student success above all else. Bring key stakeholders to the table to focus on the state of your LMS. Consider students’ satisfaction with the online learning experience and how well it is currently performing compared to alternative configurations or even other systems. Engage your product provider with your demands not only for improved system performance, but also for improved student performance. In our work helping clients with product review and contract negotiation, we often remind institutions that student success should drive vendor relationships. If your students are not succeeding, this may be due to the quality of the product and the level of service you are receiving from your vendors. Hold vendors to delivering in order to meet your stated needs.

Find a new system, if needed. Most major LMSs have made student success more of a priority, and the possibilities to maximize their systems and partner with these companies in this effort are endless. Chances are, as you begin to dig deeper into the use of your LMS, you may find yourself looking over the fence at other options. The good news is that the market is brimming with new products and compelling alternatives. Do not be afraid to shop around and think outside the box. At a minimum, this evaluation of alternative products could force your existing vendor to provide enhanced support to better meet your needs. Eduventures’ upcoming report series on the evolving LMS landscape will cover a range of issues related to system selection and optimization, with student success front and center in our analysis.

Thank you for your question. While we can’t share the whole instrument, our survey team did provide us with a couple of the survey questions pertaining to this post (please see below). If you see still have questions, please send us an email at info@eduventures.com, and we’ll put you in touch with someone who can provide more details around the survey.

Note: Self-selected groups of students took each of these questions:

Why do you feel your performance is poor or not as good as it could be? Please select all that apply.
Answer order randomized, excluding Other and Don’t know.
• It goes too fast / can’t keep up
• Not enough faculty interaction
• Distracted by family / personal obligations
• I don’t feel prepared to succeed at this level
• Lack of peer-to-peer interaction
• Poor academic support services
• Lack of tutoring options in the subjects I struggle with
• Technology is confusing / hard to use
• Lack of interest / motivation
• Unclear course objectives / expectations
• Other (please specify):
o {Text box}
• Don’t know / Unsure

Your summary states, “Poorly performing students said that, beyond the usual factors, such as personal distractions and lack of motivation, they struggle most with the pace of their courses, which many said move too quickly.” However, these “usual factors” were listed by 65% of your low academic performers. I’m not sure how alligning courses with objective design standards or optimizing/replacing the LMS does anything to address the usual factors.

Can you tell your readers what percent of the 17% of low academic performers who selected “Unclear Course Objectives/Expectations” and the 20% who selected “Goes Too Fast/Can’t Keep Up” also selected “Lack of Interest/Motivation” or “Distracted by Family/Personal Obligations” in the survey?

Thanks for your question. You raise a number of important issues here, which I am happy to talk with you about further off line if you wish. As for the survey response questions re: the “17% of low academic performers,” yes a large number (in some cases, well over 75%) of respondents cited both personal distractions and lack of motivation and things like clear course objectives.

Please feel free to reach out again via email if you want to talk further.

You know education is a choice just like the effort you put into your education is a choice. I feel like if you can not handle the pace of an online course you should reevaluate your choice to enroll in it. The majority of the reasons behind failure seem to be matters of personal choice. I can put all the effort in the world to creating a fabulous online course that is interesting and offers various modes of learning, however if the student does not choose to do the work and put in the study time then I suppose there is very little I can do about that.